


Perhaps These Are Better Than Photographs

by A_God_A_Vampire_And_Two_Heirs_Of_Durin



Series: Pets [3]
Category: Being Human (UK), The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Anders finds an alternative way of documenting his and Mitchell's memories, M/M, There is nothing cuter than finding Mitchell curled up with a rabbit and a guinea pig
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-11
Updated: 2014-08-11
Packaged: 2018-02-12 18:09:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2119698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_God_A_Vampire_And_Two_Heirs_Of_Durin/pseuds/A_God_A_Vampire_And_Two_Heirs_Of_Durin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s remarkably frustrating that Mitchell cannot be captured on camera, especially when Anders would love to be able to document the fact that the vampire is currently fast asleep on the sofa with their guinea pig dozing in his lap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perhaps These Are Better Than Photographs

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, here's more fluff for you all :) I am still working my way through my reincarnation prompts but I felt that I needed a break from them for a bit since that verse is basically an exercise in how many different ways I can have my OTP die!

There was something inherently annoying about the fact that Mitchell couldn’t be captured on film. It became especially prominent to Anders when he came across moments, such as the one he was currently observing, of his boyfriend that he would have loved to have physical proof of, and a photograph would have been a perfect reminder.

Of course, he would always have the memory ingrained in his mind, but it saddened him a little that he couldn’t show it to anyone else. As much as he would never admit it, he would love to be able to get out his phone when he arrived at work and show Dawn all the moments in which Mitchell had been looking particularly endearing. And he knew that Dawn probably would have loved that to. It would, at least, put her in a good enough mood that he wouldn’t need to Bragi her into buying him a coffee on her break, which was always a plus.

So when he walked in that afternoon to find Mitchell fast asleep on the sofa, his head resting on the back of the cushions while an equally sleepy looking Fluffy dozed on his lap, Anders’ fingers itched to take his phone out of his pocket and quickly take a photo.

Except he couldn’t and that fact irritated him greatly.

Instead, he went for the next best thing. He ran upstairs as quickly as he could so that the vampire wouldn’t have time to wake up, and threw the door open to the spare bedroom which they’d converted into a sort of home office for him. The room had boxes and files on nearly every surface, having become more of a storage space than anything else because the blond much preferred to work downstairs where his favourite brunet was usually in sight, yet he still managed to open the right drawer on the first try. On the top sat a completely blank sketchbook and a pack of pencils; just what he had been looking for.

He’d bought the drawing supplies as a spur of the moment thing, in which he’d been hoping to find the time to start up his old passion for art again but so far he hadn’t been able to decide what exactly to start sketching. Until now, that was, because there was an extremely drawing-worthy scene downstairs just waiting for him to pick up a pencil and recreate it.

He hurried down the stairs again, pouring himself a quick drink as he passed the kitchen, before settling in the armchair in their living room and giving himself a good angle to work from.

Meanwhile, as he sketched, Mitchell slept quite peacefully, completely unaware of what was happening. Fluffy, on the other hand, who looked rather content at first as she snuggled into the fabric of the vampire’s shirt, woke up about half way through and proceeded to stare intently at Anders. The blond god was pretty sure that she had no idea what was happening really, and that she was merely wondering why the awake person in the room wasn’t giving her cuddles, but when she started shifting a bit in Mitchell’s lap, Anders found himself doing frantic hand signals at a guinea pig because he knew that if she moved too much, his boyfriend would wake up before he was finished. Plus he was now slightly on edge, worrying that he’d have to hurriedly abandon his drawing materials at some point in order to rescue the small animal if she decided that she didn’t like the sofa anymore and tried to jump herself off.

It wasn’t particularly high, but it was high enough for a guinea pig.

Fortunately, Fluffy seemed to get the message, since she settled for chewing the hem of Mitchell’s shirt instead of moving anymore.

The sketch took Anders little more than three quarters of an hour. It wasn’t a finely polished piece of art by any means, but it was a full sketch and he prided himself on his ability to draw quickly. It meant that he could probably draw the vampire without him even noticing what was happening.

And then there was the question of whether to show Mitchell once he woke up or not. In the end, he decided to wait until he’d collected some more memories, and then he would show the sketchbook to his boyfriend.

Until then, he’d just have to keep the book secret, which is what he found himself doing when he shoved it right to the back of a drawer in his office that Mitchell probably wasn’t even aware existed. And then he went back downstairs as though nothing had happened, with the aim of waking the vampire up and either deciding what to order as a takeaway or to actually searching the fridge for something to make a meal out of.

However, he never quite made it that far because as he was exiting his office, his foot brushed against something furry, and he most definitely did not squeal in shock whilst leaping nearly a foot off the ground because he was worried that it was a mouse.

No, not at all.

Instead, of course, he looked down very calmly and discovered Patch staring back at him, her brown eyes wide as though she was trying to convince him that she was completely innocent.

He sighed heavily, clearly Mitchell had fallen asleep with both pets on his lap and Patch had taken it upon herself to make a quick escape once the vampire had dozed off. He could only imagine what she’d got up to in the last couple of hours.

And then it occurred to him. He was currently standing on the upstairs landing, and somehow, the rabbit at his feet was up there with him, so:

“Mitchell! Wake up! Your rabbit’s learnt to climb the stairs!”

There was shuffling from the living room and then Mitchell appeared at the foot of the stairs.

“Why is she only my rabbit when you’re cross with her?” he asked, still looking half asleep as he spoke.

“Did you teach her this?” Anders ignored his boyfriend’s question.

“Maybe,” Mitchell admitted, before grinning. “Clearly she’s a fast learner.”

The blond god sighed again and picked Patch, who was still sitting at his feet, up into his arms.

“Right, we’re going downstairs,” he told her, “And you’re not going to be going back up here, do you understand me? From now on, ignore the stupid suggestions that Mitchell comes up with.” He shot a glare at the vampire as he passed him to set the rabbit back down on the floor.

“If you saw her doing it then you’d understand why I encouraged her,” Mitchell defended himself, “It’s extremely cute.”

“I’m sure it is,” Anders replied dryly, “And when you find rabbit droppings all over our bedroom carpet because I’m pretty sure that’s where she’s spent most of this afternoon, then you can rethink whether it’s cute or not.”

Mitchell grimaced at that and quickly shot up the stairs, thinking that he should probably just check that that wasn’t the case. And if he spent rather a long time being thorough with his cleaning and it meant that Anders had to cook their dinner instead, then so be it. Although the god would probably just order them takeaway; the vampire had never quite managed to accomplish the art of manipulating the other man into doing household jobs as well as his boyfriend had.

* * *

It turned out that sketching Mitchell without Mitchell noticing was not actually as hard as Anders had thought it might have been, and by the end of a couple of weeks he had a decent collection of pictures of the vampire at various moments in their lives.

Some of the pictures had been drawn while Mitchell inadvertently posed, such as the time that Anders found him lying on his stomach in front of the television while Patch and Fluffy made themselves at home on his back. While others were snapshots that the blond stored away in his head to be drawn when he had the chance to get his sketchbook out again, for example, he now had several drawings of Mitchell down by the harbour, mostly trying to keep his curls out of his face when the wind blew, as well as other moments that he’d never thought he’d want to document. There was even one of the time he’d walked out of his office to find Mitchell and Dawn giggling over a video of a cat waving on the internet. It turned out that it hadn’t been Dawn’s cat but he didn’t forget to ask her whether her own pet could do that, to which she’d said something that had been lost as he turned to coffee machine on. Oh well.

And then came the time where Mitchell did catch him and, naturally, he was curious as to what his boyfriend was scribbling away at, because it certainly wasn’t work-related if it was making Anders smile occasionally at the page.

“What are you doing?” the vampire asked suddenly, putting down his mug of coffee and looking over at the blond, who was curled up in the armchair with the sketchbook on his lap.

“Oh, nothing,” Anders replied, his eyes never leaving the page.

“Of course,” Mitchell retorted, “I’d forgotten that it’s completely normal to stare at nothing for nearly an hour on end.”

“Hey, no need to be sarcastic about it.”

“You’re the one who gave me a stupid answer.”

For once, the blond didn’t get defensive or take offence at all, though Mitchell was completely aware that if the situation had been different, he’d have snapped at whoever he was talking to within seconds.

“Just give me a minute,” he said instead, and left Mitchell frowning in confusion at him for another five minutes.

Finally, he looked up and gave the vampire a wide smile. A genuine smile, mind you, one that Mitchell saw reasonably regularly and most other people never saw at all; one that actually showed that Anders was happy or pleased or just simply comfortably with himself and where he was.

“Done.”

He got up from the armchair and crossed over to sofa, nudging Mitchell’s legs open so that he could sit down between them and lean back into the vampire’s chest. He shifted himself until he was comfortable, which made Mitchell laugh.

“Maybe I should stop wanting more pets,” he said, “You’re like an overgrown cat when you want to be.”

Anders groaned.

“Don’t bring up the pets again. This is not about the pets.”

“I still think that coffee table would look great with a…”

“Mitchell.”

“Sorry.”

Once he was satisfied that his boyfriend’s attention was no longer on thoughts of a hamster, the blond god opened the sketchbook to the first page, which happened to be completely blank.

“And before you make any smart remarks about nothingness,” he said, “I just wanted to say that since you can’t be captured on film and I wanted to make some sort of record of our memories together anyway, I did this.” He motioned to the book resting in his lap as Mitchell rested his chin on his shoulder and looked down at it. “Go on, have a look.”

Even more curious now, the vampire turned the page to find the first drawing, the one of him asleep with Fluffy on his lap staring back up at him from the page. His sharp intake of breath had Anders stiffening uncomfortably at first until the brunet ran his fingers lightly over the page as though trying to make sure that it was definitely real.

“It’s me,” he whispered in awe, “I haven’t really seen what I look like in a while, and just, wow, Anders, these are amazing. And these are better than photographs, because _you_ drew them. You’re incredibly talented, you know that? I don’t quite know what to say to explain entirely how much I love them.”

Anders chuckled a little, his confidence returning at the praise.

“Then don’t say anything,” he said, twisting around to kiss the vampire gently, “Just keep looking.”

Mitchell went back to turning the pages, gasping in delight at each new one which was revealed to him. He loved every single drawing that Anders had done and he wasn’t sure that he’d ever be able to voice how much it meant to him.

Except, there was one missing, a scene that he wanted to see more than anything.

Fortunately, Anders seemed to know exactly what he was thinking because he kissed him again and told him to turn the last page.

“Ty gave me it,” he explained, “Or, at least, he gave me the photograph which only had me in it so I knew what I looked like but then I remembered exactly how you looked at that moment and I drew you in.”

For there, staring out of the page at the two of them was a scene from the last Johnson family barbecue they’d attended. Mitchell had his arms around Anders’ waist and the blond was leaning into him, his head tipped back slightly as he laughed at something that the vampire was saying to him.

Mitchell thought it was perfect. It _was_ perfect, and it made tears well up in his eyes at just how happy the two of them looked.

Carefully, he reached out and took the sketchbook from Anders’ lap and placed it on the coffee table, the blond watching him curiously.

“What are you doing?” he asked, before suddenly he was being turned around in the vampire’s arms and kissed fiercely.

“Thank you,” Mitchell wouldn’t stop saying in between kisses, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Anders considered just waving it all off as nothing, as he would have done if it had been anyone else thanking him, but to do that seemed callous when he knew how much this had affected his boyfriend, so he returned the affection, saying as he did so:

“I did it for you, John, and I did it for us.”

* * *

“We should have them all framed,” Mitchell said, leaning against the doorway of their bedroom that night.

“All of them?” Anders raised an eyebrow, “We’d go bankrupt from the amount of frames we’d have to buy. You’re very addictive to draw, you know?”

“At least some then,” Mitchell replied, “Especially the one of the two of us.”

The blond smiled fondly.

“Especially that one.”

“And can I photocopy some of the ones with Patch and Fluffy and send them to George, please?” Mitchell added. “I think I mentioned something about holding a guinea pig while I was on the phone with him.”

“I thought you wanted to take an actual photo of that though,” Anders said, “Something about freaking him out?”

Mitchell grinned.

“I know, but I do want to send some with me in. As well as an actual photo of me holding Patch so that it looks like a floating rabbit, of course.”

* * *

A week later, George came downstairs one morning with the intention of making himself a cup of tea, if it hadn’t already been made for him, and discovered a large brown envelope lying on the floor by the front door. Eyeing it rather suspiciously, he picked it up regardless and took it into the kitchen with him, where he found that, to no real surprise, there was a mug of tea already waiting for him on the table.

“You’re welcome,” Annie said, pointing at the mug before he had a chance to say anything.

“We have post,” was the first thing he said instead, waving the envelope in the air, “We actually have post which isn’t a gas or electricity bill. Actual post.”

“Well, are you going to open it?” Annie asked.

“Yes, of course,” George replied, “I was waiting for Nina. I thought she might want to be here when we open our first real bit of post in several months.”

Annie raised an eyebrow at that.

“I don’t think she’ll be too bothered if she misses you opening the post, George,” she pointed out, to which the werewolf conceded that she had a point and opened the envelope, tipping it upside down to remove the contents.

The first thing that fell out was a photograph, seemingly containing a mysteriously floating rabbit.

“Annie, it’s a floating rabbit,” George held the photo out in front of him carefully as though it might burst into flames or bite him. “Someone has sent us a picture of a floating rabbit. Do you think it’s a ghost rabbit? A flying ghost rabbit?”

“It’s Mitchell,” Nina’s voice drifted into the conversation as she entered the kitchen and pulled up a chair at the table, Annie quickly grabbing her a mug of tea as well from the kitchen side. “Well, it’s Mitchell holding a rabbit, I assume, because rabbits cannot fly.”

“How would you know that?” George looked at his girlfriend.

Nina rolled her eyes.

“Because that’s the living room of the house him and that blond boyfriend of his just bought,” she explained, “You really should recognise it, you were the one who demanded a guided tour via webcam. And anyway, if you’d looked at the other contents of the envelope, you would have seen these drawings and this letter.”

She spread the other sheets of paper out, revealing several of Anders’ drawings of Mitchell, Patch and Fluffy, and a letter from the two men saying that they hoped they liked the drawings.

“Well, isn’t that nice of them,” Annie smiled, getting up from the table and heading for the doorway. “I’ll go and see if there are any old picture frames lying around so we can put these up.”

When she was gone, Nina picked up the drawing of Mitchell with a curled up Fluffy tucked in the crook of his arm and Patch sitting on his lap.

“You’d hardly recognise him looking like this,” she remarked, “Who would have thought that Herrick’s former right hand man would have an affinity for small cuddly animals? I’d never have guessed, would you?”

George shrugged.

“I sort of did,” he admitted.

“How?” Nina looked entirely baffled at that.

“He’s got a book on how to care for hamsters upstairs in his old room. And I caught him reading it once.”

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like Mitchell might be asking George to post that book to him soon... :)


End file.
